Tuesday, April 20, 2010

The main reason for my trip to DC this year was for the Cherry Blossom Festival. And the main spot for that festival is the Tidal Pool, which is surrounded by many of the original trees given to the US by Japan in 1912, as well as their descendants. However, the only cherry blossoms left in the ring of trees around the basin were the two you see above. I found them down near the ground in a small protected nook of a craggy old tree. Other than those two, all the other blossoms had wilted and died or been knocked off by a rain the night I arrived. No one knows exactly when the blooms are going to peak, it varies from year to year and depends on way too many variables to calculate accurately. I arrived a week and a half after the declared peak on March 31st. I've shown you lots of other blooming cherry trees, but not the ones I really went to see.
During peak bloom, the trees in the foreground and along the shore across the basin would be covered in pinkish-white blooms. You pay your money and you take your chances, I guess.